Kali Ma
by Catslynw
Summary: Tag to episode 5-19, Hammer of the Gods: Kali isn’t done fighting and she isn’t done with Gabriel. The Destroyer of Worlds has plans. The Redeemer of worlds has plans. The angels are in for a surprise. Kali/Gabriel


_Author's note: I am not Hindi and what I know about Hinduism is somewhat limited and from my own research. So, if you spot any errors in basic facts or terminology, please, please let me know. Other than that, enjoy the story and review if you've a mind. Reviews are like food, authors go further with more fuel. Thank you, dear reader, and have fun._

Kali Ma

Kali had observed the rites of the antyesti walking disguised amongst her worshipers on many occasions, but not since the death of her beloved consort Shiva had she performed the ritual herself. Still, the movements came back like the steps of a dance, easy, flowing, and natural. And why should it not be so, she thought, when I myself choreographed each movement for the protection of the preta, the newly disembodied soul. Over the centuries, she had conducted these last rites for the sake of the souls of friends, of family, and of a particularly devout brahmin, but never before had she performed them for the spirit of an unbeliever, for one who did not even have the good grace to worship her as he should. The other gods of Hinduism, the Murtis, would be appalled… all 300 million or so of them. Though, to be quite honest, not even Kali could say how many of them had survived the onslaught of the "modern" world and the loss of traditional faith that had come with it. A god's power came from worship. Loss of worshipers meant loss of strength and a creeping vulnerability. It had left even her Shiva susceptible to attack during his mediations, a fact that a trio of western demons had been only too happy to turn to their advantage. Demons were vermin, twisted wraiths that possessed not even as much spirit as a bhuta, and yet they suffered not at all from the world's slow spiral into atheism. By all rights, they should not exist. The Christian god had much for which to answer.

And here Kali was, performing the antyesti for one of Jehovah's children. Madness. But she had been accused of madness before, and she cared not for the opinions of the others, all that mattered was the balance within her own soul, the voice of the conscious universe echoing within her mind, and the actions that karma decreed to her. None of which helped her to calm the growing frenzy in her mind and fire raging within her. So Kali focused on the ceremony. The steps of the ritual were comfortable – soothing and familiar as a soft kurta.

Removing his remains from the Elysian Fields Hotel had been simple enough once Lucifer had gone. Finding him dead, the shadowy outline of his wings burned into the floor, the ashen feathers still wafting in the air… it had affected her more than she had expected. She had attempted to kill him herself once already. Finding him thus should not have bothered her, but it did. They had been lovers once, lovers before she had known what he really was. A dalliance with one of the Asgard had been of no great matter. Had he truly been Loki, as he claimed to be, they might have continued on happily enough for centuries, but once she had known the truth, that had been impossible. An affair with one of the upstart Christian infidels was unthinkable even then. Now it was unforgivable, but Kali had allowed herself to be swayed when she had seen him again in the hostelry. Perhaps she had been alone too long. Shiva's death had left her with a hole she could not fill inside her, and Loki – so utterly unlike Shiva in every way – had done much to fill that void. The chance to be with him again for even a moment had been a gift from the universe itself, something she could not simply forego. But karma was never forgiving, and he had betrayed her, reaching for the blood of the Winchesters even as he held her in his arms. So, she had thought, it would be what it would be.

But all of that was in the past now, and only the Antyesti mattered in this moment in time. The blood of his that she still possessed would allow her to bind his spirit for a time, keeping him from the yawning nothingness that awaited all of his kind. No rebirth for angels. No second journey on the wheel. No Heaven. No Valhalla. Just nonexistence. What irony led them to call their father a loving god? She would never understand it. Stooping and lifting him effortlessly into her arms, Kali transported the angel to a small room in a home in Varanasi, overlooking the Ganges River, the holy river which flowed from the heart of her father, Himalaya. An American author had once described Varanasi as, "older than history, older than tradition, older even than legend." It was not precisely true, but it was not far from the truth either. The house alone was six hundred years old and had known this rite many times, though never with such a recipient.

There she laid the angel's body out upon a sandalwood stretcher in the center of the bare, aged wooden floor, his head pointed to the south, the direction of the dead. She lit lamps of sacred oil about him. Then, with a touch she stripped him of his western clothing. Kneeling beside him, she bathed his naked body in the waters of the Ganges, making a prayer of the cleansing, moving as ritual and the song of the dance within her blood dictated. The water ran in rivulets over his still form, flowed along the crevices of his skin to drip down his sides and pool on the floor beneath him. Her country was teeming with humanity, her people usually poor and often foolish, so that the river ran polluted more often than not in this modern age, but the water was purified by her touch, and nothing that was not pure would touch him now. When he was clean, she dressed him in a kurta and salwar of bleached cotton, handpicked, hand woven, hand sewn and entirely untainted by the touch of machinery. His forehead she anointed with the sacred ash, bhasma. In deference to his own beliefs, however misguided, she formed the ash into the shape of a cross. She would recite no heathen prayers, but she could do that much. Into his hands she placed the tulsi leaves, clasping his fingers tightly about them.

Tradition said that she should pour a few droplets of the holy Ganges water into his mouth as well, to ease his passage into the Pitrs, the afterlife, but easing his journey was not her goal in any way, and she omitted that step in the ceremony. The angel looked peaceful, more beautiful than ever he had in life as she adorned him with flowers, covering his body with roses, jasmine and marigolds. In life, a wry, ironic smile had always marred the perfection of his features. In death, the characteristic smirk was gone. She found that she missed it.

Her preparations complete, Kali assumed the lotus position and waited. For three days she waited as the oil lamps burned low and the angel's human body began the slow process of decay. His spirit she held fast, allowing him no rest, no escape. He remained, trapped within the all too mortal body of his vessel. The time passed easily as she meditated. She feared neither discovery nor attack, for the brahmans who dwelt in the lower floors of the house knew their great mother kept vigil over a fallen warrior above stairs and would die en masse before they allowed anything or anyone to catch her unawares. It had always been thus, for it had always been her way to carry off and see personally to the spirits of slain warriors, sometimes even of animals. The brahmans would protect her unto death and beyond, and even in dying would give her all the warning she would require should Lucifer come seeking her. So she meditated, waiting without impatience but with great expectation.

On the third day, as the sun rose over the Himalayas, Kali rose gracefully to her feet and assumed her other form, what most of her worshippers would consider her true form, the Kali Ma. Her skin changed hue from warm brown to a deep bluish black, shimmering like polished marble. Her arms rose along her torso, a second set springing from beneath the first. Her hair, already the black of the night sky, grew longer and thicker until it trailed to her bare feet. It was time. Lifting the stretcher, careful not to dislodge a single blossom, Kali Ma transported the angel from the house to the shmashana, an isolated stretch along the banks of the Ganges River. There a funeral pyre awaited, constructed by her loyal brahmans while she kept vigil beside the body. She placed the angel upon the pyre, but in defiance of tradition she pointed his feet not to the south and the path of the dead, but to the north. The brahmin who remained at hand lest she have need of something did not react in any way to this alteration of the ritual, but then, no brahmin in her service would. What came was what came and the Kalaratri, the night death, the ultimate mother, destroyer and redeemer in one... she was not to be questioned.

Three times she circled the body, sprinkling yet more of the Ganges waters upon the angel. Then, with no need of the torch used by her worshippers, Kali Ma set the pyre ablaze. It was well designed, expertly constructed and burned quickly, utterly consuming his mortal remains. His immortal remains, that angelic spirit, she held yet, clutched tight by her will and his blood combined. She stood, right foot forward, arms held aloft, and waited. When nothing but ash was left, Kali Ma summoned her sword, picked up the severed head of the demon she'd left waiting there days beforehand and began to dance. She danced upon the ashes, singing to the angel's spirit in her mind, her arms and legs moving in a little known kathakali, a dance not just of truth but of rebirth. As she danced, her sword rent the air, blood kept fresh by her power dripped from the demon's severed head, dropping to the ashes. The brahmin came forward pouring sacred water over the smoldering ashes, heedless of her swinging sword, uncaring of the blood frenzy which normally took her when she danced. But frenzy and bloodthirst alike had been sated three days before by the very deva who head she now dropped into the searing coals beneath her feet. Even as the demon's head caught fire, the blood boiling as poured in a never-ending stream from his ragged neck, the angel rose from the ashes, reborn.

She had failed in her attempt to destroy him three days before. She had not failed in her attempt to redeem him.

He was naked, as she was, but unlike her, he still wore his human guise. And the smirk was back. "Well," he said, "this is completely unexpected." Then, catching sight of the severed head smoking at his feet, its skin beginning to crack and peel, he added, "and that is ever so slightly unsettling. Anyone I know?"

"I don't believe so," Kali replied calmly. "Not unless you have friends among the devas."

"Not particularly, no." Summoning western style clothing to him, clearly uncomfortable in a nudity that was entirely natural to her, he stepped from the ring of bloody ashes. "So, can mercy be found in the heart of her who was born of the stone?" he asked, quoting an ancient devotional. "Why'd you bring me back?"

"I doubted your word. I attempted to take your life, and you saved mine. Karma must be paid."

"Karma. Right. I've always been firm believer in karma, myself. Why do you think I chose to pose as a trickster? Those guys always get to have the most fun."

"Loki – no, you are Gabriel…"

"Well, yeah, I am."

"Do you prefer to be called Gabriel?"

"Call me anything you like, just don't call me late for dinner." He chuckled. She frowned, and her Brahmin scrambled back from the circle of ash, clearly disturbed by her countenance. The angel was completely unaffected. Shocking it was not. "No, seriously. Call me whatever you wish. Especially if you're providing dinner."

"Even if human is on the menu? Aren't they your pets, now?"

"Come off it, Kali," he insisted, rolling his eyes. "You care about them just as much as I do. Neither of us wants to see the planet go up in flames, at least not yet and not set afire by my idiot older brother. We need humanity to stick around, otherwise, what's the point of anything?"

She said nothing, merely glaring at him.

"Still," he went on, "neither of us is going to sweat a handful of dead humans, especially if they're annoying, impious or generally a pain in the ass."

Kali Ma allowed herself to smile ever so slightly. "True enough," she agreed.

Gabriel's smile widened, becoming a dazzling and entirely unrepentant grin. "So, hot stuff, do you forgive me for lying to you all those years?"

"I knew the truth, _Gabriel_, far longer than you might suppose."

"And you forgive me?"

"I do. You… saved my life. I did not expect that."

"Yeah, and that's after you tried to shish-kebob me with my own sword. So, guess I'm the good one in the relationship." He clapped his hands together, bouncing lightly on his feet.

"You were always _good_, Gabriel. Why do you think I tolerated your appalling sense of humor in the first place?"

"True," he quickly admitted, leering meaningfully at her. "So, you busy this century? We could have some fun, get to know each other again."

"What about the Judeo-Christian Apocalypse? Must we not do something?" Kali Ma demanded hotly. "I have abandoned my hopes so easily."

"All taken care of!"

She scowled at him, disbelieving. "How?"

"Sam and Dean will handle it. I told them everything they need to know to deal with this mess. If those two stubborn jackasses can't pull it off, no one can."

"I will not sit by and do nothing. It is not in my nature."

"Blatantly obvious, my darling. The humans don't associate you with eternal energy for nothing. Still, if they knew just how much energy you really have, you'd have a lot more followers… especially male followers." HE waggled his eyebrows in what he no doubt thought was an endearing gesture.

"Gabriel," she growled menacingly.

"I know, I know. You're being all serious and earnest. You want to help save the world so you can destroy it later in your own good time. Well, we don't have to go up against Lucifer to be helpful. There's a lot of fanatical demon devotees standing between the Winchester boys and defeating my bro. We could maybe lend the boys a hand, completely anonymously of course."

Kali Ma smiled. "Of course. One would not want to be seen helping mere humans."

"Mere humans? Those two aren't _mere._"

She shrugged. "They are mortals. Nothing more."

Gabriel shook his head. "You like them."

"I do not."

"You do so. You like Dean because he's cocky and obnoxious and full of wild energy, just like me. You like Sam because you two have sooo much in common," he drawled.

Kali Ma bristled, and gestured hastily for her brahmin to leave them. The human scurried away, disappearing into the forest that lined the banks of the river. "I have nothing in common with Sam Winchester."

"Oh really? So you didn't chug a couple gallons of demon blood to juice yourself up for this little ritual? We both know deva blood is your favorite cocktail. Come on, Kali. It's okay. You can admit it. I like them too. Those kids have style."

She smiled ever so slightly. "Perhaps." It was a grudging admission, but it was an admission. Loki… Gabriel had always been able to wheedle what he wanted out of her.

"So you're in for the demon demolition then?"

She nodded, fingers tightening reflexively around the hilt of her sword. "I am a slayer of demons, Gabriel. If I kill a few thousand of the creatures, no one need suppose I did it for any reasons but my own, to avenge my fallen consort. No one need know that I am… helping… the Winchesters."

"Awesome. Channel that rage, sugar, and they'll never know what hit them."

"And the angels, your brothers? What of them?"

Gabriel looked thoughtful, almost wistful for a moment, then he shook his head. "Best we avoid them, but if any of them do get in the way, I've got us covered." He drew his sword, a real archangel's sword this time, from the inside of his coat. "So let's go cut off a few heads. Mommy needs a new necklace."

Kali Ma laughed, her heart feeling suddenly lighter within her breast. "You always say the sweetest thing, my angel."

"I do, don't I?"

Placing her right arms about his waist and back, Kali Ma led the archangel through the forest to her city and her home. Best the rest of her brahmans should meet her new consort as soon as may be.


End file.
